June was a busy month for members of the Service95 Book Club. Not only were they whisked away to 1980s New York in Jennifer Clement’s Widow Basquiat, but they were treated to new platforms for the book club. To celebrate its two-year anniversary, the club launched the Service95 Book Club with Dua Lipa podcast and an official Service95 Book Club Instagram. With these new platforms, readers can learn more about the club’s monthly read, listen to one-on-one interviews with the author, and discover other book-worthy news. July’s pick is Small Boat by Vincent Delecroix.
Delecroix is a French philosopher and novelist, using his skills to write about unusual yet extraordinary connections between people, places, and events. In 2007, he received the Prix Valery Larbaud for his novel Ce qui est perdu as well as the Grand prix de littérature de l’Académie française for Tombeau d’Achille in 2008. In 2023, Small Boat was long-listed for the 2023 Prix Goncourt, but it went on to be translated into English earlier this year. It is the first of Delecroix’s novels to be translated into English. Delecroix currently teaches at the École Pratique des Hautes Études, which is a top-tier post-graduate institution.
Giving us details about Small Boat, Dua Lipa shares,
“‘Small Boat,’ which was shortlisted for the 2025 International Booker Prize, fictionalizes events around the real-life drowning of 27 people in the English Channel in November 2021. Those who lost their lives—always referred to as ‘migrants’ in the press—were crowded into a sinking inflatable dinghy and made increasingly desperate calls for help—in French, in English, and in Kurdish. But no help came.
“Vincent takes us inside the mind of the French radio operator receiving these distress calls. I was deeply shocked that, instead of scrambling to help the drowning people, the operator casually responds to their calls for help with the frank opening line—‘I didn’t ask you to leave’—as the phone goes dead. Her attitude seems inhumane, but perhaps it is reflective of society’s detached attitude to ‘migrant’ deaths at sea and the dehumanization that allows us to turn away as innocent men, women, and children drown on a pitch-black night in the English Channel.
“Was she just doing her job? Or have we all lost our humanity? These are questions asked repeatedly in ‘Small Boat’ as the story unfolds, and the answer is not an easy one to stomach. These aren’t just ‘migrants’ or ‘refugees,’ they are people—with names, faces, and stories, united by their desperation and determination to escape conflict, persecution, or poverty. As conflicts continue to force people away from their home countries across the globe, this book pushes us to think: Will we help them? Or will we turn away as the small boats continue to sink and bodies of the innocent wash up on beaches on both sides of the Channel?
“This book challenged me profoundly. It moved me and stayed with me. It’s not an easy read, but as our politics descend into hate-mongering and point-scoring, it’s an essential story that needs to be told.”
There is much more to explore on the Service95 website about Small Boat. First, readers will be able to check out two extracts from the book, one read by Delecroix and the other by the book’s translator, Helen Stevenson. Next, readers will find two essays. The first essay makes a connection to the events in Small Boat, as it elaborates on one man’s harrowing account of crossing the English Channel. The second essay reflects on the truths found in today’s fiction books. Last, Service95 has created a list of organizations that support asylum seekers for those who want more information.
And as always, an interview between Dua Lipa and Vincent Delecroix is available, where readers will hear about the inspiration behind Small Boat, along with the various challenges that Delecroix faced during the writing process. There is also a supplemental reading list and playlist to go along with the book.
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